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Tweets not refracted

In 2009, Twitter became such a key tool for young Iranians protesting the re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that the State Department asked the micro-blogging site to postpone scheduled maintenance to allow demonstrators to keep organizing street rallies.

Twitter complied.

Likewise, it’s hard to imagine the Arab Spring blooming so quickly without Twitter. It continues to be a virtual bullhorn for protesters. This week, tweets have been taking jabs at Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the subject of protests since last Friday. “There is now a menace which is called Twitter,” Erdogan complained in an interview, according to France 24. “The best examples of lies can be found there.”

It’s not the first time that a government has been outraged by tweets. Germany and France asked Twitter to block neo-Nazi and anti-Semitic tweets within their countries.

Twitter complied.

But in stories from The Washington Post and New York Times on PRISM — a top-secret Internet surveillance program that gleaned data on foreigners abroad — one tech giant is conspicuously absent.